


A Thank You Gift

by Snow_white79



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Blood, Other, Rowena helps Sam, Sam Winchester's Demonic Powers, Sam gets his powers back, Season/Series 13
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-05
Updated: 2018-02-05
Packaged: 2019-03-14 10:31:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13588203
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snow_white79/pseuds/Snow_white79
Summary: Now that the binds have been broken, Rowena is ready for anything. She no longer feels afraid, and she has Sam Winchester to thank for that. What better way to thank him than helping him feel unafraid as well? Here is yet another story on how Sam's powers return...because they need to return, and this season is a perfect time to bring them back.





	A Thank You Gift

**A Thank You Gift**   


“I never knew you before The Cage.”   


Sam turns when he hears her familiar voice. He pauses by the bookshelf, watching her walk towards him. The university library is practically empty this Saturday morning, and Sam wonders for a brief moment if she is here because the monsters he and Dean have been looking for are actually witches and not a banshee like he previously believed. 

  
Rowena smiles softly when she reaches him. “I heard them speak of you. The Boy with Demon Blood: Azazel’s favorite child.” 

  
Sam frowns a bit. He wants to ask from who, but bites down on his question. It doesn’t matter. Rowena will tell him anyways. She has always loved to indulge. 

  
“My time with Fergus was very educational, Samuel. Many demons readily told the tale of how Samuel Winchester overpowered Lucifer himself.” She eyes him from bottom to top before continuing, “You were quite powerful for a human, and with the right guidance, you could have rivaled Azazel himself.” Her eyes shimmer at that statement, and Sam finds himself taking an unconscious step backwards, his back now resting against the shelf. 

  
Thinking of those days makes Sam uncomfortable. He remembers the raw power beneath his skin, and the thinly veiled look of disgust and fear from his brother. 

  
“The Cage broke you,” Rowena continues, not paying heed to the look of discomfort from the younger Winchester’s face. “When I met you, you were an angry and reckless hunter with a dull ache inside of you…one that had been stomped down so hard, so deep…it was hard to look at: this helpless ache churning around your human essence.” 

  
Sam swallows hard, looking past the witch and towards the stairs which led to the exit. All he wanted to do was spend a quiet hour or two in the library doing some research. 

  
“One would never know you were once this powerful being that killed Famine, Lilith and a shrew of other nasty and powerful things this world will never truly understand.” Rowena pauses for a moment, studying him. “I came to thank you.” 

  
Sam isn’t sure whether to laugh or cry. He opens his mouth, though nothing comes out. His throat feels tight and he closes his mouth, swallowing the painful lump that threatens to overtake the steadiness of his body. He hated this feeling. Vulnerability and Winchesters never sat well together. 

  
She smiles again. “Yes, to thank you, Sam Winchester. You gave me the one thing I needed to feel powerful once again. I have you to thank for that.” 

  
He nods his head, lips pressed firmly against one another. He doesn’t look at her. He doesn’t want her to see the pain in his eyes. The last time they were together, they spoke of Lucifer, and since that day, the nightmares have gotten worse. He thinks his visions may be returning as well. It hasn’t been a good few weeks for him. 

  
“And now I have a gift for you,” Rowena says, startling him as she takes his hands in hers. He almost attempts to pull away, but the fight leaves him as soon as it begins. 

  
“No thanks, Rowena.” He tilts his head towards the bookshelf behind him. “Dean and I are on a case. I appreciate the thought, but…” 

  
“I insist.” She continues, giving his hand a gentle squeeze. She smiles at him in a way that probably works with most men. But Sam isn’t most men. 

  
He pulls his hand away, smiling politely. “No thank you. I’m glad you’re feeling better though. Honestly, I am.” At least someone can feel safe again when it came to Lucifer. 

  
Rowena sighs, “I have a way for you to feel safe again too, Sam.” She pulls his hands to her chest, smiling again. “Trust me.” 

  
That makes Sam smile. The idea of actually trusting Rowena is downright insane. “Trust you? How many times have you attempted to double cross us, Rowena?” 

  
“And yet I’ve always come through in the end, haven’t I?” She says with a light laugh. “Come now, I know you’re curious.” 

  
“Not interested.” 

  
“Five minutes,” She bargains. “Five minutes of your time, Samuel. I won’t do anything without your permission. I just want to tell you my plan.” 

  
“Your plan?” 

  
“I think you’ll like it.” She adds with a teasing smile. 

  
Sam sighs deeply through his nose and bites the insides of his cheek. He’d regret this. He knows this. Sighing again, he nods his head. “Fine.” 

  
She laughs, letting go of his hands. “Yes!” 

  
“Five minutes,” Sam reminds her. Her excitement makes him nervous. 

  
“Of course. Come, let’s walk. Ears can be anywhere.” She gestures towards the stairs. 

  
Sighing loudly, Sam nods once more. The books can wait for five minutes. Dean is probably still asleep at the motel anyways. Or maybe he’s up and getting breakfast. Sam wasn’t hungry when he woke up. Then again, he isn’t hungry much anymore anyways. 

  
Once they are outside, Sam follows her to the parking lot. “Where are we going exactly?” 

  
“To my car.” Rowena explains. She stops when they reach a bright red Audi coupe. She smiles at his surprised expression. 

  
“I see you’re not going for subtly.” He comments as he follows her to the back end of the sports car. 

  
“Of course not, Samuel. I go for victory.” With a tap of her keychain, the trunk opens, revealing a worn-looking wooden chest with frayed leather straps along the sides. 

  
Sam frowns, “What is it?” He can feel the power inside of it and he finds himself biting the inside of his cheek again. He has a sudden urge to press his thumb into his hand, but instead forces himself to keep his arms at his side. 

  
“You can’t tell?” She asks with an arched brow. She raises both brows when he looks at her, challenging him to lie. 

  
“What is it?” Sam asks again. He has a feeling. He can feel something…familiar. And it scares him. 

  
“When your brother killed Azazel, his followers dragged his bleeding vessel back down to hell.” Rowena carefully pulls out the chest, continuing, “They poured his pure, demon blood into a bottle and placed it safely inside this box.” 

  
“Why?” Sam asks, eyeing the box as if it may explode. 

  
“For you, of course,” She answers, glancing up at him. “They were so sure you would take your place on the throne and fulfill your duty as their Boy King! Giving you Azazel’s blood would have given you absolute power over Hell to rule and lead the demon army to victory.” 

  
“Well…they were wrong.” Sam says with a forced smile. He doesn’t like remembering those days at all. His own father told Dean to kill him if his brother couldn’t save him. 

  
“Perhaps.” Rowena comments with a shrug. She looks down at the chest, and then back at Sam. “But they kept it. You still have followers in Hell. Demons that believe in you and are waiting for you to take your rightful place.” 

  
“I don’t want it, Rowena.” Sam remembers the pain inside of him each time the demon blood would burn out…the need to drink demon blood consumed him…burned him…he couldn’t go back to that. 

  
Rowena nods her head. “Of course, Sam. I understand.” She smiles suddenly, “But perhaps you wouldn’t need to go that far?” She waits for a reply. She can see Sam trying to figure her out, and she can feel the nervous tension radiating off of him. 

  
“Was it really that bad?” The witch finally asks. “Having all that power? Being able to exorcise demons…killing them even, with just your mind? Being able to move things, control objects in order to save others?” 

  
Sam closes his eyes for a moment, remembering. “It was short lived. It never lasted as long as I wanted…and the pain afterwards…” he shakes his head. “I needed more blood all the time. I was a monster.” 

  
“You weren’t a monster, Sam.” Rowena says kindly. “You were doing what you do best. What is it your brother says? Saving people, hunting things?” 

  
“Dean once told me that if he didn’t know me…he’d hunt me.” Sam confesses softly. 

  
“Well,” she sets the box back down into the trunk. “Luckily, your brother does know you.” Patting the box, she looks back at the taller man. “No one truly explained to you what Azazel’s blood did to you, did they?” 

  
He shrugs, taking a small step backwards, his eyes staring at the box. He isn’t sure he wants to know. 

  
“Azazel loved to experiment. He wanted to see what would happen if he fed his blood to infants. He was curious to see if they would resemble a Cambion. At the same time, Lucifer had instructed him to search for you, his true vessel, and to give you some of Azazel’s blood as well, so that you could be stronger and withstand all the tribulations that they both knew would come at you. Life was never going to be fair. Not for you.” 

  
She takes a step forward. Sam doesn’t move away, but he does finally turn to look at her. She continues. “You always had a gift of visions and telekinesis. Azazel’s blood moved through you slowly, maturing as you matured, and when the time was right, his blood supported your gifts by pushing them forward. They never went away, Sam.” 

  
He shakes his head. “I don’t--” He doesn’t want to be like that anymore. He wasn’t in control. He needs to be in control. There’s too much in his life that he can’t control. 

  
Rowena takes his hands in hers. “The blood you drank from other demons wasn’t the same. That blood burned through you because it wasn’t the blood of Azazel. Only the pure blood of the first demon you drank from can maintain that level of strength you possessed. The blood you later drank only gave you a short-lived jolt to push you through when needed, and then dropped you so hard you couldn’t use your natural powers if you even tried. And that was Ruby’s trick all along. She needed you to be so dependent on her so that you’d listen and follow her instructions, suggestions…everything in order to break that final seal.” 

  
Sam pulls his hands back. He doesn’t need a reminder of what happened next. 

  
Rowena isn’t deterred. She continues to explain the truth. “It was Azazel’s blood that saved you, Sam. When Castiel pulled you out of The Cage and then Death returned your soul…it was Azazel’s blood that kept you alive and coherent.” 

  
“I don’t know if coherent is the right word,” Sam retorts softly, not sure if he should laugh or not. Hallucinations every single day, unable to sleep for more than a few minutes at a time…if that was coherent, he’d hate to see what could be worse. 

  
She smiles, “Perhaps not. But even when Castiel took away your psychosis you still had all those memories locked inside your mind. Even now, when you close your eyes, you can still see, hear and feel every moment of your time in The Cage.” 

  
Sam shoves his hands in his pocket. He wants to leave, but forces his feet to stay where they are. “It doesn’t matter.” Because Lucifer is out there, again, in his world. It didn’t matter if Sam was awake or asleep. Lucifer will always be there. Taking a deep breath, he glances back at the wooden box. 

  
“Azazel’s blood has given you the strength to endure. And this box…this gift to you..will help you remember that feeling again. That feeling when you stopped being afraid.” She gestures back towards it. 

  
Sam looks at her quickly. His heart racing in his chest. He can’t even remember what it’s like to not feel afraid. Every morning he wakes up wondering what terrible thing will happen today. Who will be hurt? Who will die? And every night he sits in his room and wonders when it will be his turn, and will he die alone. His nightmares have gotten worse. Most of them involve Dean being murdered by Lucifer while Sam helplessly watches his brother die. He knows it isn’t a real vision. He knows it’s probably Lucifer sending him this nightmare to remind him of his place: Lucifer will always win. 

  
Rowena pats on the box again. “The blood in this box will give you the strength you need to fight back when the time comes. And we both know the time will come, Sam.” She gives him a leveled look, reminding him of the reason they are both here. “There will be no withdrawal symptoms. His blood will stay inside of you, pushing your powers forward once again, and this time adding more.” 

  
“More?” 

  
“All of Azazel’s powers will be yours. You won’t be as strong as Lucifer, but you don’t have to be in order to beat him. You overpowered him once with less power,” the witch reminds him. 

  
Sam studies the box. He remembers Dean’s words in that dreaded voicemail. The one where Dean calls him a vampire, among other things. It wasn’t until years later that it was brought up one late evening after Mom had gone to bed. It was right after Sam had killed the Alpha Vampire. Drinking beer that evening made his tongue loose. He brought it up, and Dean looked as if he had been scalped. Sam sighs deeply. Angels were just as bad as demons. Maybe even worse. It was hard to trust anyone. 

  
“You don’t have to drink it,” Rowena continues. “It will take time for me to prepare since it is still frozen. I can inject it inside of you. That would probably be better anyways….less messy.” She scrunches her nose at the thought. 

  
“Will I still be…human?” Sam asks. He can’t believe he is actually considering this. But Lucifer is out there. 

  
She nods, “Mostly. You’ll be more attuned towards things like demon traps, holy water and salt lines, but they won’t affect you, and no one will notice any difference from you if you come into contact with them.” 

  
He remembers his time in The Cage more vividly now. He remembers the helpless feeling inside. He remembers how he forced himself not to care that Lucifer was in Castiel’s body and sitting in his bedroom. It didn’t matter. His feelings didn’t matter. There were more important things going on. He remembers so much pain…pain that never ends. That helpless feeling is becoming harder to hide, and harder to close. 

  
“I’m staying at the Lowes Vanderbilt Hotel. Club level.” She hands him her room key “11th floor. You can follow me, or you can stay and brood a bit more. I’m leaving in the morning.” She shuts the trunk and Sam flinches at the sound. He reminds him of a hammer hitting a knee. His knee to be more precise. 

  
She walks over to the driver’s side of her car. “Think about it, Samuel. I’ve been there. I went through that feeling of being afraid, and helpless… knowing that if Lucifer found me again the tortures I would endure would be 10x worse. But those feelings are gone now.” She smiles widely, and Sam can see that she believes her own words. “And that is in part to you. For helping me; by giving me that page in the book. And now, in turn, I want to give you this feeling. I want you to have that, because I know what it is like to not feel safe. And it’s a horrible feeling, Samuel. And you’re drowning in it.” 

  
Opening the door, she sits inside and starts her engine. Pausing, she looks up at him and smiles, waving slightly before closing the door and driving off. 

  
Sam watches the car go for a moment. Looking back at the library, he pauses. They have a case that needs to be solved. Someone is dead. Someone is always dead. So many people die. And Lucifer is back. He can’t avoid that knowledge. Sam walks away from the library and instead moves towards the Impala. Lucifer is out there, somewhere. He’ll never stop. Someone has to stop him. 

  
Turning on the ignition, Sam drives onto the main road. He can see Rowena’s flashy red Audi a few cars ahead of him, turning into the hotel. He takes a deep breath, and follows. 

  
He parks his car while she goes through the valet. It doesn’t take long for him to enter the swanky hotel and enter the elevator, using the club access key to ride towards the top floor. He closes his eyes, grateful that there isn’t anyone in the elevator with him. Taking a deep breath, he wonders if this might be a trap. If he just fell into yet another trap. Shaking his head, he wills himself to stop thinking this way. He helped Rowena, and she is helping him. If anyone can understand what he is going through right now it’s Rowena. And even she knows what she went through is nothing compared to the tortures he has endured under Lucifer’s hands. 

  
The elevator finally opens and Sam steps out into the quiet hallway. The room is to his right. He takes another deep breath before putting the key inside and pushing the door open. 

  
Rowena’s hotel room is bright, and very spacious. He’s surprised to see a set of stairs leading to another floor. Walking over to the large window, he looks down at the city below. 

  
“I’m upstairs,” Rowena calls out. He turns to the sound of her voice, but doesn’t answer. Instead, he looks back out the window, watching the cars for a few more moments before deciding he’s wasted enough time. 

  
Sam reaches the top floor quickly. Rowena is placing objects on a table, the dark red bottle is sitting in the middle of it. She glances over at him. “Take your shirt off and lie down on the bed. You might as well get comfortable.” 

  
Sam wants to argue, but instead he unbuttons his flannel and pulls off the t-shirt underneath. He hears an appreciative sound coming from the red-headed witch. 

  
“If you ever want to learn what fifth base is, let me know, Sam.” Rowena practically purrs with a teasing smile. She laughs when his eyes widen. Shaking her head, she gestures to the bed. “Don’t worry, you big Moose. I won’t ever do anything without your consent.” 

  
Those words mean more to Sam than she probably realizes. Or maybe she does. He doesn’t ask. Instead he sits down on the bed and watches her. 

  
“It isn’t that hard,” Rowena explains. “First I use a simple spell to set the blood to the right temperature. Then I manually settle them into a row of vials.” 

  
Sam’s gaze follows her hand to the row of vials. “That’s a lot of vials to fill.” 

  
She nods. “That’s where my expertise comes in. Too much blood, too fast can cause an overload. Normally, transfusing this amount of blood will take weeks to prevent your heart from stopping. But with a little of this and that, I can get this done within the hour.” 

  
Sam nods his head. He is surprised that he trusts Rowena with this. Maybe he figures that if this doesn’t work, he deserves to be dead for considering it. Leaning back on the pillows, he closes his eyes. “Have you ever done this before?” 

  
“No,” Rowena answers truthfully. “But I’ve done enough similar spells to be able to master this one on my first try.” She pauses to look at him. Eyes still closed, he nods his head, accepting her response. She smiles, returning to the task, humming softly. 

  
It isn’t long until the blood has filled all the vials in front of her. She begins to work with the intravenous line, setting it up before moving towards Sam on the bed. “Are you ready, Sam?” 

  
He opens his eyes, surprised that he had dozed off. He wonders if the song she had been humming was a sleeping spell. Getting his bearings, he looks around the room and then back at Rowena. “It’s ready?” 

  
She nods her head. “Yes. Are you?” 

  
He looks down at the needle in her hand and follows it up to the IV line that she will be using to continuously feed him more of Azazel’s blood. He remembers last night’s dream once again: Lucifer slicing into Dean as his brother hung helplessly on the wall until finally the screams die out along with the light in Dean’s eyes. Lucifer will never stop until everyone is gone. And then what? Will he kill Sam as well? Or will he throw him into the cage to suffer another millennia? Will Sam be alone and guilt ridden? Will Lucifer even let him die? Will he ever feel peace? 

  
Sam nods his head. “I’m ready.” 

  
She smiles at him, proud. “You’ll never be afraid again, Sam.” She doesn’t look back at him when she presses the needle into his skin. “Relax,” she whispers, feeling the tension under her hands. She hears him exhale. “Good. Here we go.” 

  
It’s like a shot of adrenaline. Sam gasps, his back arching off the bed. His mouth opens but he can’t bring himself to close it. He can feel every muscle and every bone in his body move. He can hear the blood roaring through his body. And then it slows. Blinking, he closes his mouth and swallows. Sam can hear Rowena chanting, but he doesn’t bother to try to listen. Instead he feels a second jolt shoot through him. It’s like a whistle of a train, and bright lights dance across his vision, blinding him for a moment before everything returns to focus. It’s so much brighter, clearer: crisp. He can almost taste what he sees. 

  
The shots continue, each one bringing him to another level of hyper focus. He can feel the power building underneath his skin. It warm, safe, tight. He feels secure. 

  
Sam starts to laugh, and he is sure he must sound hysterical. But he thinks he can hear Rowena laughing with him. Sam can’t stop laughing as more blood is pumped inside of him. Lucifer will never hurt him again. Lucifer will never hurt anyone every again. No monsters will ever hurt them. He will never be afraid again. 

  



End file.
